Monday, July 12, 2010

The Old School Renaissance is a mess!

The OSR is messed up.

Good.

It means that the freedom of the Open Gaming License is working. There no gatekeeper, no one publisher that authors are beholden to do the stuff they want to do. You get good stuff, and you get crap. You get nice folks and well... not so nice folks. Older authors get a second chance to make things their way, new authors get a chance to make things.

Well, I think people are going to focus on what they want to focus on—be that the positive or negative. I’m not sure why some people would choose to focus on what they’ve chosen, but that’s on them. In large part, we make our own experience in the hobby. It just depends on how much dung we have to scrape off our boots along the way.

I think a lot of the heartache is that OSR is just three initials to describe a general zeitgeist. There's nothing more substantive to it and some people either want it to be less abtract that that or already see it that way.

To me, there is no debate... There are plenty of OSR Games I can choose from, enjoy and share. So many, in fact, that I find myself taking a bit from here and a bit from there and making something akin to way we used to play back in 1978/9 when I bought the Blue Book (Holmes).

Ah, the glory days of merging AD&D weapon damage, Judges Guild randomness and Gamma World into one hell of an adventure in the Village of Hommlet with swords, blasters and a quest for seven shards of a magic crystal.

Yes, these days are much akin to the days of yore and I am loving it!!!

Oh, thank goodness! I thought there was something wrong with me - being one of the first few, serious OSR publishers and all.

Actually, I rather enjoyed getting to visit with some of the TSR folks back at Troll Con in 07'. And they were very nice to me as well. When do get to go to another, con, I'm looking forward to doing so again.

People can butt heads without being buttheads (not specifically calling anyone a butthead). We may all disagree with using the term OSR or not using, but in the end it's all semantics. If you like classic versions of the game and like saying you're part of the OSR for the sake of promoting the game, great!If you like playing classic versions of the game, but the three letter OSR really rankle your feathers, don't use them. Nobody is holding a gun to your head.I don't really see where the controversy is.

See, I already have a full set of heroes, role models and social groups. I don't need any more in that department. But what I really could use are some neat play aids and adventures for my games. So that's what I will look for, and route around the rest.

Bat in the Attic Games

How to make a Sandbox

The Old School Renaissance

To me the Old School Renaissance is not about playing a particular set of rules in a particular way, the dungeon crawl. It is about going back to the roots of our hobby and seeing what we could do differently. What avenues were not explored because of the commercial and personal interests of the game designers of the time.

What are RPGs?

A game where the players play individual characters interacting with a setting with their actions adjudicated by a human referee.

Rules are an aide to help the referee adjudicate actions and to help the players interact with the setting.

Dice are used to inject uncertainty which make a tabletop RPG campaign more interesting than "Let's Pretend".

The only thing a player needs to do to roleplay a character is to act if he or she was really there in the setting in that situation.